I'm Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman
by Sick Of It All
Summary: Like most teenagers Buffy Summers is waiting for someone to love and understand her for who she really is. But Buffy has a secret, and it's not what you think.


**BPOV**

My name is Buffy Summers. I am sixteen years old and live in Los Angeles. Even though to look at me you would see your average all American sweetheart. A pretty blond wearing the latest clothes from the trendiest boutiques with the kind of marked up matching accessories that would make Joan Rivers scowl in envy.

But I'm not like other girls. You see, I have a secret.

I suffer from gender dysphoria. I was actually born a boy.

And this is my tale.

Ever since I can remember I never felt right in myself. I wish I never had this body. Now most Californian girls will whine and bitch about their nose or ears and wish that they could change them if only Daddy would pay for the surgery. But for me, this was something else. Something that ran far deeper.

I was born Brian Andrew Summers and I'm kind of sure that my father never really liked me. You see I was never the kind of boy to play football or climb trees or poke kittens with a stick, I felt much more at home drawing pictures of puppies and rainbows or going to my neighbor's house and having tea parties with my friend Suzie much to Dad's embarassment. She was about my age and when I was with her I always felt more comfortable as she would dress me up in her clothes and practice her make up techniques on my small face. It was just fun playing dress up but the other boys in the neighborhood would always call me a sissy or a faggot but at that age I really had no idea of the meaning of these words. I had no idea that these were just the first moments of true cruelty I would encounter in this world. They were, after all, just words.

I alway remember when Mom and Dad actually got on, though I'm sure a childhood desperation to view everything as being peachy helped warp those facts into unreliable memory. When Mom got dressed up she always looked so elegant, beautiful flowing hair and her heels that shone like blackened mirrors and I wanted so much to be dressed just the same. I was often inconsolable when they left, the babysitter just putting it down to a spoilt little brat wanting his Mommy and Daddy's attention all the time. Far from it. In an effort to cheer myself up I would sneak into my parents room and try on some of Mom's clothes parading up and down in front of the full length mirror they had in their room.

I would tuck my boy parts back between my legs, god how I hated to see them. Everytime I looked at my reflection I felt hideous. Like some kind of deformed monster until it got to the point where I wouldn't even look at myself below the neckline. Satin panties and a ruffled bra, though way too big, felt as natural against my skin as it was for me to wear them. A little lipstick and blusher sealed the package and as I looked at my reflection I knew that this was me. The real me. A girlish mass of fuzziness forced to lay dorment behind this shell of vague masculinity. Wow, that thesaurus that Aunt Steph got me for Christmas really does help.

Once when I was twelve years old the babysitter caught me dressed. I cried and sobbed that I was just playing a game and begged her not to tell my parents. I was in near hysterics at the thought that my parents would hate me for being so sick, that there was something wrong with me. But she didn't. Her name was Noelle and was about 15, five foot nine with luscious black hair, and I think she was the first person I ever fell in love with. Once she calmed me down and promised that no one would know she said she would help me explore that side of myself. She helped me apply my make up properly and even selected some of my Mom's clothes that she thought would suit me a little better. The slimline summer dress and strappy sandals I wore were quite plain but I felt like a princess and for that one night I finally felt alive. It broke my heart when she moved to Colorado with her parents knowing that the one confidant, the one true friend who knew who I really was had gone. I slipped back into my shell of loneliness feeling nothing but inadequacy.

I think I stopped growing when I was about ten, 96 pounds at most and standing at only 5 foot 2 inches I was small even by the standards of a generation whose parents had taken recreational drugs throughout the seventies. Even the girls at school were bigger than me and used to pick on me but I would never fight back I was too afraid and I felt like a freak, and not just physically. There was always something inside me that felt wrong, like I was inferior. I felt detached from myself with this 'sexual ambiguity' I once heard it called on one of those 'laugh-at-the-freaks' shows on cable TV shown at 4am.

But who could I tell? My father? Let me tell you a little about the man who I once called Daddy.

Once he and I were watching a cheerleading tournament on ESPN and he smiled at me and turned to his bloated beer stained friends and said "That's my boy, he's gonna grow up to be just like his old man. He hasn't been able to take his eyes off those hot chicks all night".

How could I tell him that I wasn't watching the girls, even though they were gorgeous, I was staring at what they were wearing. That they were so free to be able to wear such pretty clothes and make up not shoplifted from a dime store and not feel ashamed or scared that they would get the crap kicked out of them. I felt myself die a little inside knowing that I'd never be able to look like them.

I can recall quite vividly Dad shouting at the TV one time as he spilt beer all over the sofa which would no doubt earn him a severe tongue lashing (and not the good kind) from my Mom when a pretty young lady appeared on the screen. I asked him what was wrong and he shot me look as if I'd just taken a wizz in his Joe Montana commemorative frosted beer mug.

"What's wrong with HER?" he screamed "It's a MAN, what the fuck are they thinking putting a fucking faggot on TV?".

I was shocked that this beautiful blond on primetime TV in a stunning red sequinned dress was really a man! He was so beautiful. Even then I knew how much I craved my Daddy's love and if I told him I was jealous of this TV queen and wanted to be able to dress just like her/him he would hate me forever such was his negativity at this simple lifestyle choice, and I just couldn't bear that. So I kept quiet and firmly buried my secret deeper inside me.

When I was about eight Mom caught me wearing her leotard that she would wear to yoga class. It's tight fabric clinging to my slim body like a second skin and made me feel like the pretty ballerinas and gymnasts I envied so much. I somehow managed to convince her that I was just pretending to be a wrestler as they wore stuff like this. She smiled and went along with it but it lead to something worse.

She told my Dad and he dragged me to some touring Mexican wrestling event in an effort for me to "man myself up" whatever that meant, sounded like he got it from a fifties right wing pamphlet. I found it so brainless and macho watching El Diabetico fighting Anal Bandido that I didn't enjoy it in the slightest, but Dad did, he said it would make a real man out of me. Yeah right, because two oiled up, muscle bound guys rolling around with each other wearing tiny leather shorts, nope, nothing gay about that at all.

I tried to like sports and pretend to be interested in cars just so he would want to spend some time with me, so we could talk about something......anything. It didn't stop him from leaving though. I was nine when he went and for so long I thought it was my fault. That it was because I wasn't butch enough or tough enough to have him say he was proud of me.

Mom had caught me crying a few times. Each time she would ask me what was wrong. She thought it was the stress of the divorce but through my tears I would tell her time and again that I couldn't tell her. I was too ashamed to tell her the truth.

Maybe him leaving had left me with a deep rooted fear of rejection that I've never been able to shake. That's why I couldn't tell anyone what I was feeling, that's why I never had any real close friends in case they found out my desire to dress and act like a girl. What if they hated me too. Mom had told me time and time again that him leaving was nothing to do with me and of course I played the dutiful 'son' role and agreed with her when in reality her words just compounded the fact that he was gone and it was because there was something wrong with me. That he knew what I really was and bailed before I could shame him. I haven't even seen him since I was eleven and since then I would count myself lucky if I even got a belated birthday card obviously bought from a gas station at 2 am after Mom had phoned him up to chew him out for once again forgetting I even existed. It was easier for me to think of him as dead, as to him, I already was.

But as much as I tried to deny it, that desire to feel feminine was always there. I became more and more distant to the point that having dinner with Mom became more of an endurance trial than a family meal. Only monosyllabic answers peppered the once joyous evening meal prompting Mom to attempt the usual "Are you on drugs?" lecture.

"What?" I spluttered out shocked that she would even think I would be.

"Honey, are you on the crank?" she asked staring deep into my shiftless hazel eyes.

"The what? I don't even know what that is" I snapped back honestly.

Of course Mom, like every parent of this generation, thought I was on drugs as it was the latest media frenzy scapegoat rather than actually try to find out what was killing me softly. I think deep down some part of her suspected something as her favorite silk lingerie was never where she left it. I, of course, feigned ignorance and try to pin it on her new boyfriend Rupert Giles.

He was an uptight, educated Brit but he had a sweet and kind nature that instantly made me like him. But not like that. Though I wanted to be a girl I was still straight, a male lesbian maybe? Who knows.

Mom thought my teen surliness was due to Giles taking over the role of being the 'man of the house'. He was welcome to it, it was a job I never wanted anyway.

If only it were that simple.

I would often fall asleep and wish upon every star in the sky that I would wake up without a penis. That I could at last wake up and live as a girl, brushing my silken hair into braids, coloring my lips with a soft pink and slipping on a pretty floral print dress before kissing Mom and Giles goodbye and running off with all my girlfriends to talk about hair extensions and the latest Jimmy Choo's on our way to school. When I awoke to the warm California sun the same as I ever was I sobbed silently as it was just fantasy. A fantasy that scorched my soul at all times until it started to become unbearable.

I wished I didn't feel like this. It was so frustrating and upsetting. At school seeing the beautiful young ladies in their flowing summer dresses and new Louboutins flaunting their enrapturing femininity in front of me while my eyes burnt with jealousy. They swept the corridors completely unaware of the secret longing that ate away at my soul, piece by piece, day by day. I wept that moment at the realization that I would never be like them. I would never be happy. I could never be....me.

I once tried to indulge myself but got caught shoplifting a pair of panties. I turned on the waterworks and begged that no-one be told as they were for my girlfriend and that I couldn't afford them. Lucky for me the head of security was so hungover he couldn't even think straight let alone care so he let me go with a warning. I don't think Mom ever knew why I avoided the mall at all costs.

I felt so empty, like a freak. I honestly think I'd gain more acceptance if I were a seal clubber, or a holocaust denier or something.

I was never in the popular crowd and didn't have any real friends. Most thought it was shyness, but it was fear. Fear that if I confided in anyone I would become the laughing stock/punching bag for the whole school, if not the whole community, if the dreaded truth was revealed. I was aware of drag queens and the like (this was LA after all) but they always seemed a world away from me, like they were just attention whores with no real understanding of true frustration and were in it for the money. I was wrong, but at this point I was ready to spit my venom at any given target.

Of course I tried my subtle ploy of gradual change by pretending to be like the metallers in the school who liked Marilyn Manson (whoever she was) and even once tried to get away with wearing nail varnish. Just a shade of black that shone blue when caught in the light but the vitriol of the popular kids was so scathing that I hid in the toilets and attempted to chip it off with anything I found in my pencil case. Protractors work well I found.

I felt so......abnormal, like God has fucked up and put me in the wrong body and was constantly mocking me from his fluffy smog ridden clouds as my torment grew.

Each morning I wept a little more.

I existed, that's all. I didn't live.

I had written in my Dorothy (from the Wizard Of Oz) journal with my furry pink pen (yeah, I know it's cliche but I liked them) and pulled out the pages to give to Mom, telling her exactly what I was feeling, how I was trapped inside myself and had all these emotions and thoughts building up but I had no idea what to do about them, but in the end I was too scared of her reaction to show them to her so I kept them hidden in the back of the closet. There's symbolism in there somewhere.

Can you even imagine what's it's like to feel feminine in every possible way but when you looked down, IT was always there to remind you?

My only release was my weekly 'outing' but held firmly behind closed doors. I usually did this while Mom and Giles were away at another art show, it was always Mom's dream to have one of her own. She had been running the Moore Foundation Of Modern Art for two years now and as much she loved it she felt she was being stifled by the petty beaurocracy that came with the territory. Pretentious artists had stripped her of her true desires at making the world a more beautiful place. I could relate....in a way.

I had found Mom's old wedding dress in the loft but even though I was desperate to try it on all it's corsetry made it a two person job, after all who hasn't dreamed of being a beautiful blushing bride. Perfect hair and make up capturing all the attention of a room as she slowly glided around feeling like she was queen of the world. So I compromised.

As Mom and Giles were no doubt straining to keep their false smiles up at the gala opening I sat reading Jeffrey Eugenides' "Middlesex" in Mom's three inch black pumps and her/my favorite blue silk Chinese dress which I had to pad out a bit. I had stolen a padded bra of hers which had been put in a box ready to be sent to Goodwill and I had adjusted it with duct tape and staples so it now cupped my chest comfortably as I stuck some rolled up socks in them as a substitute for any budding breasts.

My nails a deep shade of red with matching lipstick applied with the perfection gained from hours of applying and re-applying her beauty products in secret. Mom's black stockings ran over my smooth legs with a sensuous thrill, I kept my body free of hair, not that there was much to start with, but with my size and voice yet to break it seemed puberty was playing a waiting game. That only compounded my social discomfort and gave the neanderthals at school even more ammunition to use on me. My hair was now shoulder length but a dark blonde, not the glowing sunshine Legally Blonde I wanted to be but I was still faking the retro grunge look letting it fall limply in my face whilst at school but when I was Buffy it was smooth and shining. A soft frame for my sweetly painted face.

My new babysitter was a bitch and I avoided her at all costs spending all night in my room with a screwdriver rammed in the door frame as it didn't have a lock. I knew she would never come up here as she would rather spend all evening with her latest boyfriend making out on the sofa and watching Jackass than ever find out if I was still even in the house. I liked it like that, and so did she. Everyone was a winner.

As my reflection swayed before me I felt beautiful, desirable even. I looked deep into my own eyes and said "You are beautiful Buffy" knowing that this was the only time I'd ever hear those words.

Buffy was my name when I was en femme. Buffy Anne Summers, it had a nice ring to it. It's who I am, who I'm supposed to be. It suited me, or rather, it suited the girl I longed to be. The name Brian caused me to wince everytime I heard it now, it was a monicker so far removed to who I was it did nothing but anger me every time those coupled syllables rang in my ears. But as Buffy? When I was her I felt natural, normal even. My reflection even carried something so rare I'd almost forgotten it's existence......a genuine smile of happiness.

A girl at school once said that masculinity was wasted on me. She was right.

I carried on staring and twirling in front of the mirror wishing silently that one day a girl would sweep me off my dainty feet and love me despite my hideous deformities. That "someday my Prince(ss) would come", (I loved Snow White.) That my......penis, god I even hated saying that word, was nothing but a birth defect and after a while I had almost convinced myself of that. But not yet. Fairytale endings are for idiots right? But it doesn't stop a girl from dreaming.

A few months ago that had changed.

// FLASHBACK//

I had started to lose weight and was barely sleeping as my soul eroded at not being able to be the person who I knew in my heart, I truly was. As my body and mind began to unravel I felt so lost. Drowning at the expectations heaped on me from birth. "Be the man of the house, play football, drink beer and beat up anyone that was perceived as being even slightly different from the norm". That wasn't me, it never would be. I felt truly abhorrent in myself to the point where I could no longer look in the mirror at my boy form. Salvation was out there, it just had to be. I was desperate.

Enter the internet.

I thought it would be my rescuer. A helping hand reaching out to me. But all I found were terms and labels for who, or what, I was but nothing and no-one to inspire me or encourage me to be true, 'cos in all honesty, I didn't have the balls to be a woman. Or I did...but I mean, I had the.......crap, you get what I mean.

I wasn't a transvestite, that much I knew. This was a deep rooted affinity for femininity, hey that rhymes. Kind of.

When I discovered the term 'gender dysphoria' it was like a revelation. I can remember exactly what it said as those words were now branded into my brain.

"Often they never identified with being male, predetermined since birth they have a discomfort with their gendered self".

I read all I could that night and, after disregarding anything that Wikipedia said, my confidence buoyed at the realisation that there was now a light at the end of the tunnel. A very small light and a very long tunnel. But at last......hope.

'Gender Dysphoria', just two words, but a couplet that would forever change my world. Or so I thought as though it pretty much summed me up it didn't really help. I now had an idea of why I felt like this but how the hell could I tell anyone? So I tried the anonymous approach of fake names and casual internet conversation with others who might be able to understand.

I had joined a number of TV/TG/TS chatrooms but my naivety just seemed to make me a magnet for every deviant out there who got their kicks from forced femininity or some such thing, but I really had no idea what they meant. I was a scared lamb in a cyberspace wood full of wolves. I knew there were genuine, caring transgendered people out there who I'm sure would love to take a young boy like me under their wing and let me blossom into the woman that I wanted to be, but I never found any of them. So I logged off from them permanently and went back to my closet of self pity and mounting self loathing.

_//END FLASHBACK// _

I wanted to wait and confront Mom and Giles and tell them everything but how the hell do you broach a subject like that? "Mom, how was the art show? By the way I was born in the wrong body and desperately want to live and be thought of as a girl". I couldn't do that. What if she hated me? What if Giles hated me too? God, what if they were so ashamed of me that they stopped loving me?

Maybe I should've started taking antidepressants, but at this point that was like putting a band aid over a spear-through-the-head wound.

I couldn't bear it if the only two people who genuinely cared for me would always now look down on me with so much hatred and disgust. I stared blankly at my reflection as I was struck by the simple succinct epiphany. I would NEVER be able to be this girl, I'd NEVER be able to be happy.

The elation I felt just a few short minutes ago from once again being Buffy came crashing down and I burst into tears. I couldn't risk losing the ones who loved me, but I couldn't bear to be trapped in this sickening form any longer. I stared in the mirror, my slim frame encased in shimmering silk and with legs beautifully smooth it only made me even surer that I was going to do the right thing.

Confusion and anger had lead me to this place I never thought possible. I had been drowning in my despair and self loathing with no visible escape route for so long now. Wallowing in the misery I could share with no one.

I didn't have the strength or courage to tell the people I loved how I felt or who I was behind the mask. For the last few months I had been consumed with these thoughts and I finally knew the only resort left for me. The one avenue that would make everyone happy, at least in the long run. I would never have to feel so disgusted at myself, and Mom and Giles wouldn't have to be ashamed of me.

I just wasn't strong enough. Having to wake up everyday and have to spend it in those clothes, in this body, in this goddamn life.

I went to the bathroom and reached for Mom's bottle of painkillers (being a Mom in LA she had almost every prescribed medication available) and opened the bottle of wine I had hidden at Christmas.

I don't know if it was because I was brave or if I was a coward but once those unbranded pills slipped down my throat accompanied by the sweet, rich Chardonnay I knew there was no turning back.

That's how Mom found me.

Lying on my bed, my once beautifully applied make up smeared with tears down my face, in her blue silk Chinese dress, an empty bottle of pills in one hand and in the other a crumpled note that read simply "Please God, let me die a girl".

**JPOV**

After I paid the babysitter and sent her home, trying not to draw attention to the fact that her shirt was on inside out, I made my way upstairs to say goodnight to Brian.

I was a little tipsy as Richard DeCoupe had decided to let my gallery give the premiere of his new works and so we had been drinking in celebration. At first I tried to resist but he kept refilling my glass and soon I had found myself in deep conversation working my way round his broken English. It was fun but I couldn't help feel a little guilty as Rupert would have to be the designated driver. Yet again.

"Brian? Brian are you still up?" I called softly as I opened his bedroom and door and saw him lying on his bed.

"What the hell?" I thought, but I might have said it out loud, damn that French lush.

My drunkeness muted itself for a moment as I sensed something was wrong. So very wrong.

"Brian what are you....why are you wearing my dress? Brian? BRIAN!!" I yelled.

I walked over to his bed watching his quiet form. Why was my son, my little boy, wearing my clothes, and wearing my make up? I got closer and looked at his face. He looked so small, so sad. After a second I noticed that his lips were a shade of red which I didn't own but somehow looked darker underneath.

The scene I had walked in on quickly sobered me but I couldn't take it in. Was this some kind of prank? What was going on? What's my bottle of pai....no, this wasn't....he wouldn't do.....oh god.......OH PLEASE GOD NO!!!!

Thisisn'treal, thisisn'treal, THISISN'TREAL!!!!!!!

"BRIAN!!!" I shrieked.

I shook him roughly as Rupert ran in at my obvious distress. I cradled my baby in my arms pleading with whatever powers that be that my little boy wouldn't be taken from me as Rupert ran to call an ambulance.

I ran my now shaking fingers over his gentle face and cried harder than I have ever done in my life. I had never told Brian this but I had miscarried a couple of years before he was born and thought that I would never get over it.

But that pain paled in comparison at the thought of losing my angel. My only child. When he came into my life I swore that he would be my treasure, my beautiful light that I would protect forever.

Brushing his soft hair out his face my throat ran dry as I entered that place beyond pain. Beyond fear. Where words were meaningless and nothing made sense. Just a torrent of emotion to send your walls crumbling to dust.

That's when I noticed a piece of paper in his other hand. I pulled it free and read it.

"Please God, let me die a girl".

WHAT?!

I lost all feeling as a maddening sickness flushed throughout me. Brian wants to be a......he wants.......he wants to......no, this had to be some kind of cruel joke, didn't it?

The next few minutes were a blur as I struggled to digest what was going on. I stared at the limp form in my arms. A loving mother's arms weren't they? Was I really that blind to how much pain at my baby was in? Blind to how much I really knew about my son? Had we become so distant that he would rather take his own life than talk to me. What kind of mother am I? That my...

My mental ramblings were halted as the paramedics burst in to start working on him. At first I refused to let go of his small body and became near hysterical when they tried to take him away. He was my baby and if I could just hold him he would be alright. Everything would be alright.

Rupert shook me and told me that I needed to let them help Brian. I reluctantly let them take him and that's when it hit me. That last angry thud of your heart when you realise that nothing was going to be alright.

I went in the ambulance with Brian but I was now in such a daze that time lost all purpose. Rupert said he'd grab some things and follow in the car. I held Brian's hand as we wheeled out to the ambulance and, as expected, the usual group of curious neighbors had began to gather but I barely noticed anyone or anything around me.

Just my baby.

In so much pain.

And I could do nothing to help.

What the hell just happened?

**GPOV**

I quickly grabbed a few of Brian's things and piled them haphazardly into a bag. What was going on? I thought Brian was so cold and surly because he didn't like me, but now? I picked up the note Joy had let slip from her hand and read it. I....I........ This was unreal. How did I, we, not know this? How did we not notice this? My grey matter shifted into autopilot as I picked up his underwear and his favorite books was just about to leave when I noticed a journal laying open on his table. I hadn't seen this one, usually I was a keen observer of people but with this revelation I must admit to some kind of social cataracts. I picked it up and belying my natural sense of honour and decency I couldn't help but take a quick peek at it. I stood there with my mouth hanging open as I flicked through a few pages.

"Oh dear lord".

**JPOV**

As I sat by Brian's bed I noticed his make up for the first time.

Wow, he really is good at that. Even the mascara is...no wait, what the hell is wrong with me? Here's my son lying in a hospital bed with all sorts of tubes and wires hooking him up to all these damned machines and all I can think is how well his make up is applied. God, what kind of person am I? Am I really that terrible a mother? Am I so wrapped up in my own world of galleries and public image that I was blind to how much pain my baby was in? My only child and I let this happen? God how stupid am I?

I noticed that my breathing had become perfectly synchronised with Brian's. As if my strength would be able to lead him back to me.

Rupert walked in hugged me from behind. He tried to say the right things, the kind of words of comfort that should be appreciated at a time like this but I shrugged them off as I all I can think of is the small hand in mine. So cold, so delicate, so....well manicured. GOD, what is wrong with me!

"There's something I think you should see" Rupert says in his quiet gentlemanly tone and hands me a girls diary. Brian's diary? At first I want to scream at him for betraying his privacy like this but as he pulled of his glasses to wipe them I could sense something disturbing behind his words.

I took his diary and began to read from today's date. It was confusing so I started from the beginning.

My hands shook and my voice refused to work as the tears wouldn't stop falling. He was so hurt, so alone.....he wants to be a.....I just don't......It's been eighteen years since I last smoked but boy, could I use a cigarette about now. As I read on the startling truth of it began to seep in, that my baby, my son, would rather die than continue to be trapped in this body, in this constant misery. I can't wrap my head around this, it's too much to take in.

God I want a cigarette

**No-one's POV**

Joyce got up and headed out surprising Giles with her apparent callousness but it was far from the case. Switching his gaze from the woman he loved to the silent boy in the bed whom, though it had been hard, he had grown rather fond of. The Englishman stared at Brian's gently rising chest, desperately feeling for this wretched child and what he must be going through but he was not the only one suffering here. Making a decision he went to find Joyce as Brian would need her more now than ever before.

Joyce stepped outside the squeaking automatic doors and let out the breath she didn't even know she had been holding. Turning she caught the eye of a fellow escapee who smiled back weakly which Joyce begrudgingly returned. This obviously stressed stranger offered Joyce a cigarette which she gleefully took, lighting it and then the silent man disappeared back into the neon lit labyrinth to go back to his familial duty.

Joyce inhaled deeply and her lungs refused to co-operate causing a coughing fit during which Joyce threw away the cigarette reminding herself exactly why she had given up. Just as her breathing returned to normal she felt strong, warm hands upon her shoulders accompanied by a soothing voice.

"I didn't know you smoked" Giles said.

"I don't...... haven't for years. I just really.....oh god Rupert", she turned into his arms and sobbed heavily. Her whole body shaking as the emotional tsunami coursed through her. After a few minutes of expelling her salty tears she looked up at her lover.

"Did...did you read it?" she asked.

"Bits and pieces" Giles affirmed "Enough to know that this isn't just a phase. It's something much more serious".

Joyce bit her lip as she confessed "I..I caught him, Brian, in one of my dresses once."

Giles looked at her surprised but kept his arms around her allowing her to continue.

"It was about a year after Hank left us. I thought it was just one of those 'curious pre teen' stages. Having only a mother's influence in his life I thought it was my fault. He didn't actually know I'd seen him though. I hid in my bedroom and peaked out the door into his room." Her voice began to crack and she threw her head back in exasperation "God, if only I'd talked to him about it I...I..I could've stopped all of this"

Giles gently wiped her tears away with his ever present hankerchief and tenderly asked "How did he look?"

"Quite pretty actually, though my dress did clash with..."

"No Joyce, I mean how DID he look"

"He looked.......happy..." she replied meekly raising her eyes to meet his "He looked happy but now I..I...".

Giles held her in his arms as her freshest batch of tears began to cascade down her features.

"It's not your fault. No-one knew, he..he didn't know who to turn to" he said softly with his traditionally stiif upper lip beginning to quiver.

"But why did he want to ki...hurt himself like this. Hurt me like this..."

"It was a cry for help honey. Only we didn't listen, all we can do now is listen to what he really wants."

"But c..can we just...I...I mean..." she stammered hoping to buy some time to think things through.

"Joyce, listen to me, this is not a time for procrastination. That is what lead us here....he....._she_... needs us" he said in his smooth velvety tone, emphasising the feminine pronoun.

Joyce wanted to correct his mistake but just nodded numbly knowing what she had to do. What she had to accept in order for them to move on from this awful, awful place.

They looked into each others eyes both reflecting the others pain and fear but they knew this was not a time for pity. This was a time for their strength to shine through as they knew that there was a scared child upstairs who would need every ounce that they could muster.

Bracing themselves and wiping away their tears they headed back in unsure as to what would unfold.

But this was family and families stood by each other.

No matter what.

**No-one's POV**

Brian began to flicker his eyes open. They stung at the harsh clinical light all around and screwed them tight again hoping that this wasn't heaven because if it was, it sucked big time. No, he heard beeping machines, distant approaching sirens and disgruntled women yelling about methadone.

'Crap, hospital......or Jerry Springer' he thought and silently cursed every paramedic in the world as didn't want to face the consequences of his actions.

His attention was drawn to the soft lilting voice calling his name. His eyes clenched even tighter as he knew as soon as he opened them he would be greeted with the sight of his mother and face up to the pain that he had caused her. He slowly raised his eyelids and after the initial blurriness subsided his eyes were caught in the loving, yet thoroughly bloodshot gaze of his Mom.

"Mom" he croaked, his voice straining as he reached for the tube uncomfortably resting against his nostrils.

"I'm here honey, no don't touch it, it helping you breathe" Joyce cooed in her best motherly tone, gently stroking his hair.

"Mom...I..I.." but he couldn't contain himself anymore and burst into tears yet again. All the years of hidden pain and misery flooded out. All the sorrow he had caused multiplied his already caustic feelings of self hatred and manifested themselves in a torrent of tears and choked out sobs, responded to in kind by Joyce whose own guilt threatened to consume her. She reached over and hugged him tightly which he reciprocated with vigor.

"Why honey, why?" she forced out struggling for breath.

He wanted to answer but what could he say?

"Brian, just talk to me".

Joyce felt her son's lightly built frame stiffen as she whispered his name. He pulled from her loving embrace and turned to his side forcing his face away from her. To say Joyce was feeling her heartstrings become taut and then snap one by one was an understatement. She knew she had to do something or risk losing her child altogether and they had both suffered so much this night. So she took a step that, once taken, might damage their already fraught relationship to breaking point or, she hoped, would start them on a new path. Together.

"B....Buffy?" she whispered.

Brian's eyes snapped open and whipped his head round startling his mother. He couldn't believe what she had just said. Did she really say it or was it just the medication still permeating his system that had him hallucinating now?

"W..what did you call me?" he gargled out.

Joyce smiled warmly "Buffy, that is what you wanted to be called isn't it?"

Brian couldn't believe it. He had longed for his Mom to look upon him with unconditional love and call him by his name. His real name.

"But how did yo..." he started but then he noticed his diary sitting on the bed. The once perfect pages now a little dogearred and all the true horror of his situation exposed itself to him. "You....you read my diary...how could you..it was my..." he was starting to panic adding an element of anger to his voice but Joyce cut him off.

"I had to honey, I....I was desperate. I needed to know why you would...... try to hurt yourself." She picked up the diary and clumsily leafed through a few pages before staring him straight in the eyes. "I'm so sorry Bri....I mean Buffy".

"DON'T" Brian snapped "Don't talk down to me, don't call me that if you don't mean it!"

"Honey please, I'm trying to understand but it's alot to take in,..I... I'm trying " Joyce's voice began to waver, cracking slightly as she had to ask him the question she knew she had to but desperately didn't want to ."Do you...do you really feel this way. All these years, you've not said anything, but do...do you......doyoureallywanttobeagirl?" she blurted out in an effort to shorten the suffering.

Brian looked down, his gaze falling upon his hands which he fidgeted with nervously. Joyce gently lay her hands upon his and said softly gathering all the motherly honey coated tones she could, "Sweetie......do you really want to be a girl?".

He could no nothing but nod his head slowly. His heart pounding as he knew that there was no turning back now. No do-overs. No ignoring this as an amusing anecdote to tell the relatives at Thanksgiving between the pumpkin pie and the re-run of MASH.

"Why didn't you tell me? We could've talked about this, I...I could've helped you". Brian whispered an answer but his mother couldn't catch it, "What was that?"

"'Cos I was too ashamed. I c..c...couldn't bear the thought of you hating me too...I..I..." It was all too much for the already stressed out teen as he began to bawl again, crying himself hoarser in the process. Joyce pulled him to her tightly and rubbed his back in small circles whispering her love for him no matter what over and over.

"Honey, I could never hate you, understand? Never" she cooed.

When he had finished crying he was on the brink of exhaustion and Joyce laid him back on the bed. That was when he realised that all his fears were for naught as his mother truly loved him for who he was, regardless of the shell he inhabitated. He felt exhilarated at the comfort of her arms and it began to dawn on him just what she meant with every little gesture and sweetened word.

Giles popped his head round the door and said that visiting hours were over and that they had to go.

"But Rupert can't I just..." Joyce began.

"I'm sorry, I explained it to the doctors but the patient need _her_ rest don't you" he said with a little twinkle in his eye looking at Brian. Brian's heart swelled and if he had any more tears left in him they would have sprung forth at Giles's simple but heartfelt comment. He felt Joyce squeeze his hand as she stared at Giles, her love for this usually taciturn Englishman grew even more as he had read the situation perfectly and was willingly giving his consent to the journey they were all about to embark on.

Brian couldn't believe it, that this was just some morphine fuelled fantasy. That they would be so accepting so quickly, but he had underestimated the unconditional love that any parent has for their child.

"I'll be with you in a minute honey" said Joyce before returning her attention to the boy in the bed. Taking a deep breath she hardened her mettle before saying the words that her son had been dying for her to say. "Sweetie, if you want this, if you really, really want this. Then....then I...we... will do everything in our power to help you. This... thing you're going through....you don't have to be alone anymore. Your happiness means everything to me honey, and if... becoming a girl will make you happy.....then I, I mean Rupert and I, will help in everyway that we can".

Brian tried to speak but Joyce beat him to the punch. "No sweetheart, we'll talk about this tomorrow. Just get some sleep ok, I'll be back in the morning".

She kissed him gently on the forehead forcing her tears back as with that kiss she was not saying goodnight to her daughter, but saying goodbye to her son.

"Thanks Mom, I'm so....so sorry I couldn't.....you know....... before....I never w...wanted to hurt you" came his weak voice.

"Shhh, honey we'll talk all about it in the morning ok".

"Ok, goodnight Mom".

"Goodnight.......Buffy". She smiled sweetly as she left and Brian's face payed homage to that old forgotten friend, a genuine smile.

He didn't see his Mom hug Giles and start to cry on the way to the car because Joyce knew she had to be strong though her love for her new daughter would forever mingle with her grief for her son.

It was going to be hard, so very hard.

On all of them.

But this was just the beginning.

My name was Brian Summers, and this was the day that he died.

My name is Buffy Summers. And this was the day I finally got to live.

And this is my tale.

(Authors notes -- . This has turned out alot more angsty than I had planned but then again, life isn't all roses and rainbows is it? Later chapters will be less in the angst vein and more humorous (I hope). It may be a while before we get to Sunnydale and don't worry, it will be B/F.......eventually. Please be patient with me as, a) This is my first fic, b) I have a terrifyingly short attention span, and c) I am very, very lazy)


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